untraditionally
by bravevulnerability
Summary: "Stick around for next year, Beckett. You can be Pocahontas," he teases, nudging her with his elbow. "Not even in your dreams, Castle." An AU Thanksgiving oneshot set post 2x18 (Boom!)


**Set post 2x18 (Boom!). In this universe, the timeline has been arranged so that the events of this episode take place in late November (conveniently close to Thanksgiving) rather than the original air date for the sake of the story.**

****This was just supposed to be a little holiday oneshot, I don't know how it turned into this. ** **

* * *

><p>Castle climbs the stairs with precaution, balancing her coffee in his right hand and wincing when the creamy liquid sloshes against the side of the mug. He breathes easy once it settles again, takes the final two stairs to reach the second floor, and takes the practiced route to the guest bedroom. It's early, but Beckett is dressed when she answers his soft knocking on her door.<p>

"Morning," he beams, holding out the steaming cup of freshly brewed coffee to her.

She accepts it with a small smile, murmuring her thanks, and he's about to go, leave her to enjoy her morning without him there to disturb her, but then he notices the suitcase opened on her bed.

"You're packing?"

Kate sighs and takes a step back, allowing him to come inside the guest room for what he assumes is the sake of privacy.

"I'm going to check into a hotel," she announces and his heart sinks. He always knew this arrangement was temporary, but he wasn't prepared for her to leave so soon, and not on today of all days.

"Why? You haven't even had the chance to go apartment hunting yet and I thought you were… I thought you liked it here."

He doesn't mean to sound so dejected, to elicit that guilty look in her eyes, but it's been nice having her in his home, leaving the precinct together, sharing dinner with her and his family. It's hardly been a week since her apartment blew up and landed her in his guest bedroom, but he had started to believe that she belonged here after only the first couple of days.

It didn't hurt that he had access to her room at night, able to check on her when his nightmares got the best of him and assure himself that she was alive, not engulfed by flames or bleeding to death at the hands of a man who had become obsessed with her, with ending her life. All because of him and Nikki Heat.

"I do," she nods, diverting her eyes to the ground and fingering her mother's ring. "But it's a holiday, Castle. Holidays are meant to be spent with family."

He bites his tongue to suppress the words that automatically rise to his lips, swallows them back down, because she's not ready for that yet.

"So are you spending today with your dad then?" he asks instead, watching her take a long sip of the cooling liquid still cradled in her hands, a low hum vibrating along her throat.

"You put cinnamon," she murmurs, that same, lovely little smile she tries so hard to hide from him flirting along the corners of her mouth.

"Kate."

"No, he's out of town right now and he doesn't… he doesn't like Thanksgiving much anymore."

The fingers curled around her mother's ring clench and then drop to her side.

"Then stay," he says before she can try to come up with an excuse, plowing ahead when the smile falls into a frown. "Alexis loves you, my mother does too, and it'd be a privilege to have you here."

"Castle, I can't just-"

"Thanksgiving isn't about family," he argues quietly. "Not solely. It's about being thankful. I'm thankful for you, Kate."

It's too much, he knows it by the flare of distress in her eyes, the instinct to run, and he almost resigns himself to the fact that he can't win her over this time, but then she sighs.

"It's come down to sappy begging?" she quips, one of her eyebrows curving upward, and his chest deflates with relief.

"I can keep going," he challenges and she holds up her palm.

"No, I'll - I'll stay. But check with Alexis and Martha first."

"Deal. Now put your suitcase away."

* * *

><p>Alexis and Beckett take over the kitchen, much to his surprise and his mother's delight. They still allow him to help, to tend to the turkey roasting in the oven, but after Alexis (the traitor) tells her about the deep fried turkey incident of 2008, Beckett teases him mercilessly every time she catches him peeking at the bird. But he doesn't mind, actually, he's quite thrilled to see her so at home in his kitchen with his daughter. Alexis teaches her how to make their obligatory green bean casserole and he can hear Kate sharing recipes of her own, incorporating them into their small family feast, the mention of her mother sometimes sneaking into the conversation.<p>

"You've never had a woman over for one of our holiday dinners before, Richard," Martha hums, sipping at her wine as they sit in the living room, only half watching the annual Thanksgiving Day parade playing across the screen of the television.

Castle narrows his eyes on his mother, trying to decipher exactly where she intends to take this conversation.

"She had nowhere else to go," he shrugs and his mother rolls her eyes.

"You think I didn't hear you begging her to stay?" she questions and his ears go warm. He had thought both his mother and daughter were still sleeping in when he had brought Kate her coffee and made his plea for her to join them for their holiday festivities "When are you two going to stop dancing around this…" She waves her free hand in a circular motion. "The _thing_ between you?"

"There's no thing," he hisses, checking over his shoulder to make sure Kate is still too busy with Alexis to hear his mother's dangerous questions. "Beckett's just - a friend, you know that."

"Mm, and that's all you want? Friendship?" Martha quips, red lips curling up into a knowing grin, and Castle buries his face in his hands, groaning quietly in exasperation. "All I'm saying, son, is that life is short and I just don't see the point in wasting time when it's quite clear what you desire. Maybe you could hang some mistletoe atop her door, kiss that girl while you're still somewhat young, and get the ball rolling," his mother muses, swirling the white wine in her glass and - wait, _somewhat_ young?

"It's Thanksgiving, Mother," he sighs. "Mistletoe is Christmas."

Martha waves him off, as if this detail holds no significance to her idea.

"Already planning ahead for Christmas, Castle?"

He jumps at the sound of Beckett's voice behind him, but she's only smirking when he turns on the couch. Which means she fortunately missed the important pieces of his mother's unhelpful chattering.

"We're out of ingredients for the stuffing, Alexis wants you to run to the store and grab some more," she explains, propping her elbows on the back of the couch near his head while she speaks, giving him a lovely view of the cream colored sweater stretched across her chest.

She looks pretty, he thinks. Softer than what he's used to seeing at the precinct, with her hair in loose waves around her face and only a touch of makeup to her eyes. Mm, she smells nice too, like cherries and spices, and-

"Castle," she huffs, reaching out to flick his ear and he startles, meeting her eyes and finding a hint of laughter in the warm gold. Her eyes look like an autumn storm today and he really wants to kiss her regardless of the fact that his mother is watching them with far too much interest and his daughter is bustling around the kitchen in a panic over her lack of makings for dinner.

"Stuffing. Store. Ingredients. Got it," he nods, forcing himself into a standing position and meandering his way towards the coat closet.

"I'll text you a list of what I need, Dad," Alexis calls from the kitchen. "Kate and I will be working on dessert while you're out."

"You're making dessert?" he grins at Beckett while he slips into his coat.

"Pumpkin pie," she confirms, crossing her arms over her chest as if she's going to have to defend her choice, but he has no arguments.

"Oh really? After my last time in your kitchen, I didn't consider you were big on baking, Beckett."

She rolls her eyes and approaches him as he deposits his keys and wallet into his pocket.

"Bet it'll be the best pie you've ever tasted," she challenges, her eyebrow forming a perfect arc, and he smirks in return, the urge to kiss her swirling up again with fierce intensity.

"We'll see. Either way, I'm excited to try your cooking, you and my daughter make quite the dynamic duo in the kitchen."

A smile flickers across her lips and she spares a glance back towards the kitchen where Alexis is gathering armfuls of jars and cans from a cabinet.

"Thank you, by the way," he adds, a little quieter to keep his mother from overhearing.

Kate's brow furrows, but the gentle curve of her lips doesn't falter.

"For what?"

"Alexis and I always have fun cooking together and preparing for stuff like this, but I think... I think she's having an even better time with you."

Her face falls.

"Oh, Castle, that's not-"

"No, no, it's a good thing," he assures her. "She looks up to you and she's enjoyed having you here and I could hear you two exchanging stories and I just-" He shrugs and buries his fists in his coat pockets. She makes him nervous these days; makes all the words get jumbled in his head and tangled on his tongue. "I'm just glad you can be here today."

Kate sighs and glances over her shoulder, assuring herself of Martha's lack of attention before placing a hand on his arm.

"I'm glad I'm here too," she murmurs, squeezing his bicep just once before letting go, but the imprint of her touch remains branded onto his skin despite the layers of clothing that separate him from her touch. "Be safe out there. I'm sure you know how crazy the Thanksgiving crowds can be."

He swallows back the unexpected swell of longing and quirks his brow instead.

"Worried I won't make it back to you?"

"Worried you won't get us the required ingredients," she corrects without missing a beat and he chuckles despite the jab.

He resists the urge to peck a kiss to her cheek on his way out the door and has to take a deep breath once he's on the other side. Having Kate Beckett in his home is wonderful, this domestic side to her so welcome and inviting, but it's also dangerous. Because his mother was right, to an extent. There's something between him and Kate, something subtle and tentative and ready to blossom, but they're both too scared to find out what it is and he's not yet feeling brave.

* * *

><p>"Oh my god, how did you do this?" he moans, savoring the sweet spread of flavor from his last bite of her pumpkin pie on his tongue.<p>

Kate grins from across the table, smug and satisfied, but with a hint of true pride in her eyes. The detective and his daughter had done most of the cooking and it's a change – he's not used to having so little work to do in the kitchen – but it's so very welcome. Everything Kate and Alexis put together for the meal had tasted as good as it looked. The casserole, the sweet and mashed potatoes, the stuffing - all cooked to perfection and he's so relieved his turkey didn't fall short of its edible companions this year.

After Alexis had shared all of his embarrassing moments involving Thanksgiving turkeys of the past, he was _not _going to create another with Beckett present.

But Kate's pumpkin pie is the best he's ever tasted and he doesn't so much want the recipe, but the story behind it. And maybe for her to make it for him again.

"Secret recipe," she replies, sharing a wink with his daughter, and Castle shoots up in his seat.

"She shared it with you?" he gasps, watching in horror as Alexis adopts the exact same expression Kate currently wears.

"Maybe," Alexis teases, spearing another piece of pie with her fork and smirking around the first bite.

"Beckett," he whines, leaning in towards her. "What do I have to do besides torture it out of my daughter to know the recipe?"

"Hey," Alexis huffs, flicking one of the display leaves scattered across the tablecloth at him.

"Sorry, Pumpkin. Priorities."

"You'll pay for that."

"Tread lightly, baby bird."

Kate huffs a laugh at the two of them and he smiles despite himself. She's been smiling all day, more than he ever imagined possible, and he relishes in each lift of her lips, feeling his heart excel every singe time.

"It was a female family recipe, Castle," she reveals and he cuts his eyes to Alexis, but it seems she's already heard the story he craved. "My mom passed it down to me and made me promise to do the same." She hesitates, biting her lip for just a second, before she shrugs and directs her eyes back to her plate. "Or something similar."

She's not making a big deal out of it, so he shouldn't either, but… she just shared her mother's recipe with his daughter. And that means something that not even he can find words for.

* * *

><p>"One year he made us all dress up as pilgrims," Alexis chirps and despite the glare he shoots her for sharing one embarrassing family secret after another, he revels in the melodic sound of Kate's laugh beside him.<p>

They had all migrated to the living room after dinner, his mother and Alexis curled up together in the larger of the two armchairs and Kate taking a voluntary seat beside him on the couch. Everyone had needed some time to recover from the exquisite meal that had left the four of them with swelling stomachs. Alexis had been the one to start reminiscing over old memories, going back and forth with Martha while Kate listened on in amusement. Of course, most of these stories revolved around him doing something stupid that Kate Beckett should have never known about, but rather than rolling her eyes at the antics of his past, she keeps glancing to him with a small, but affectionate sparkle in her eyes.

"Stick around for next year, Beckett. You can be Pocahontas," he teases, nudging her with his elbow.

"Not even in your dreams, Castle."

Alexis launches into another story, a more recent one from only a couple of years ago, and he can tell it will be her last of the night. His daughter is always the first to turn in after Thanksgiving dinner, her full stomach sending her into a quick slumber just like it once did when she was a baby, and by the growing heaviness weighing down her eyelids, he knows it won't be long now.

His mother seems intent on giving the two of them as much alone time as possible, so by eleven p.m. that night, his mother and daughter are both upstairs in bed, and Castle is alone with Kate Beckett in his living room.

"My mom loved Thanksgiving," she murmurs, so quiet in the comfortable silence they've found, he almost misses it. "I always thought it was the most boring holiday, but I think she may have loved it more than Christmas."

Rick angles himself towards her on the sofa, offering up his full attention to her as she shares one of her memories of the holidays for a change.

"Yeah?"

She smiles - a fragile thing that crawls across her lips - and nods. "She would decorate our entire place with all of these autumn themed decorations the week before. I have no idea where or when she would get them, but we had fall colored wreathes, decorative leaves she would hang from the walls and drape over the tables, scented candles – it drove me crazy sometimes," she admits with a soft shake of her head. "But I would always help her, because it was one of our traditions." She swallows, the breakable little smile cracking from her lips. "I didn't get to help her that last year."

Any hint of joy at hearing her reminisce about her mother disappears and sorrow fists around his heart.

"Kate-"

"And you should have seen her on the actual day," she chuckles, pushing past his attempt at comfort and wiping at her eyes, but Castle still takes one of her hands in his own, thankful when she allows him to keep it. "It was always just the three of us and she would cook a feast big enough for an army."

"Leftovers for weeks?" he tries and she grins, but shakes her head.

"We'd keep a couple of containers worth, but we'd take the rest to the local homeless shelter."

And he could picture it so clearly – the tight knit little family that was the Beckett's, sharing a meal much like the four of them did today, but taking it a step even further and making a difference. She was always making a difference; it must have run in the family.

"Your mom sounds like a good woman."

He represses the momentary urge to jump when her cheek presses to his shoulder, the unexpected contact breaking his heart and making it soar all at once, and he adjusts his grasp on her hand, threading their fingers over her knee.

"She was," she whispers, a sullen breath of a sigh slipping past her lips, and Castle rests his cheek to the top of her head.

"Mother and I usually had our Thanksgiving dinners at a diner near our apartment, but there were a few years when we just ordered pizza," he murmurs with a shrug, catching the small lift of her cheeks against the soft fabric of his sweater. "It was nice, though, because it was just the two of us," he confesses, something he's never actually told his mother or anyone else. How much those days really meant to him. "Normally, we were surrounded by her acting troupe, a new boyfriend every once in awhile, but she reserved the important holidays for me when she could."

Kate hums and he glances down to their intertwined fingers when she begins circling her thumb atop one of his knuckles.

"So how'd you get so good at making Thanksgiving dinner?" she asks and he has to blink past his haze, past the awe that fills him every time her thumb sweeps his skin, before he can answer her.

"Lots of practice, cooking show marathons, and many years of trial and error," he lists. "Sometimes Alexis and I would end up with pizza too."

Kate laughs this time, quieter than before when his mother and daughter had added to their company, and curls in just a little closer into him, her thigh pressing pleasantly against his.

"This might be my favorite Thanksgiving yet," he admits, the warmth of her next to him causing his brain to mouth filter to falter, and he purses his lips to keep any more from spilling out.

"Mm, why?"

He doesn't answer and he knows she knows why, but she doesn't run, doesn't escape to her room like she does anytime conversation between them has gotten a little too heavy for her liking while she's been staying with him.

"It's the best Thanksgiving I've had since she died."

They don't speak for a while after that and he's always been one to fill the silences, to talk without any chance for an awkward pause, but for once, he doesn't feel the need. At least for a few minutes, that is.

"Hey Kate?"

"Hmm?"

"Is that homeless shelter still open?"

Beckett lifts her head from his shoulder, her eyes already wide with knowledge. "Castle, you don't have to do that just because-"

"Hey, what if I just want to make my traditions more noble?"

She levels him with one of her most familiar glares, what he's deemed as 'the look', but he doesn't cave.

"We have a lot of leftovers, more than we need, and your mom had the right idea all along. It's too late tonight, but we can go in the morning. You, me, and Alexis."

"What about your mom?"

"Did you see how much wine she drank? She'll be out until noon," he huffs and she smacks his arm in reprimand, but hides her snicker in his shoulder, tilting her forehead into the rounded bone before she realizes what she's doing and drifts away, placing a respectable, regrettable, distance between them once more.

"You know, Beckett, maybe you should stick around for next Thanksgiving," he muses, casting her a sideways glance and feeling his lips spread into a sly grin when she glares at him for the second time in return.

"It's too early to be thinking about that, and too late to be talking about it," she decides, sitting up and rising from the couch with her usual grace. He forces himself to stay, not to walk her up the stairs to her door like this is anything more than another normal night in the loft, but he can't help feeling cold without her against his side.

"On call tomorrow?" he asks, unashamedly stalling her departure.

"Yeah, coming with me if a body drops?" she quips with an arched brow.

"Of course. It's best I stay with you at all times, since I've become pro at saving your life and all."

Her eyes roll, but she hesitates before she can make her leave, biting her lip as she twists her fingers and eyes the stairs.

"Beckett?"

It happens so quick, he almost misses it, but before she can make her escape for the night, she bends at the waist, leans in, and drops a kiss to his cheek.

"Night, Castle."

And then she's standing tall again, bounding up the stairs, leaving him dazed and dumbfounded on his couch.

* * *

><p>It's the same routine every night – falling asleep only to wake from a nightmare and then battling with himself over whether or not he should check on Kate just to make sure she really is okay. Because in his dreams – his vivid, horrifying dreams that brand themselves onto the backs of his eyelids – she's far from okay. She's burning alive.<p>

Castle rises from the bed.

He ascends the stairs in silence, skipping over the fourth from the last step that makes the creaking noise and tiptoeing his way to the guest bedroom at the end of the hall. She never locks the door, which probably means more than what it should to him, and Rick pushes the bedroom door open with practiced ease, cracking it only wide enough for him to poke his head inside and indulge in just a second of studying her.

Kate's breathing is steady, her body curled on her side with the comforter pulled up to her chin, and he feels the unwarranted panic that had constricted around his stomach loosen.

She's here, she's fine, she lives.

"What do you see?"

He startles in the doorway, jerking sideways and bumping his shoulder into the frame, hard enough to leave a bruise.

"Castle, be quiet," she hisses. "You're going to wake Alexis and I don't want her to get the wrong idea about why you're up here."

Rick huffs and rubs at his injured shoulder, slips inside her room and shuts the door behind him with a quiet click.

"She's already caught me sneaking up here to check on you," he admits, leaning back against the hardwood.

"So have I," she smirks, pushing up on her elbows in the bed and unfurling the covers on the opposite side of the mattress. "Come sit."

He hesitates.

"C'mon, Castle. I hear you come up here almost every night and I want to know why."

"I thought you were sleeping," he murmurs, keeping his eyes on the ground until he reaches the guest bed.

"Duh," she chuckles, tugging him down by the arm so that he hits the bed in an ungraceful plop at her side. "Nightmares?"

"Yeah," he sighs, propping himself against the headboard, rubbing at his eyes, trying to scrub away the images still lingering there. "The Dunn case. When your apartment was on fire. I see you burn."

Apparently, holding hands is something they do now, because Kate captures one of his, cradles his large fingers in her palm.

"I do it too sometimes."

He glances down to her, her head back on the pillow while she stares up at him with understanding he's only ever seen pieces of before.

"Check on me while I sleep?"

"Mhmm." She turns her eyes to his hand, following the path of her fingers as they twist and twine with his. "In my dreams, it's you, not me."

"Why don't I ever wake up when you're checking on me?" he questions, almost indignant at the thought of missing the opportunity to catch her sneaking into his bedroom just to reassure herself of his presence.

"Because you sleep like a bear in hibernation," she mumbles, grinning to herself at the disgruntled noise he answers her assessment with. "And I'm a trained detective. Every time that door opens, I wake up."

Great, so he's been disrupting her already strained sleeping schedule to appease his own unnecessary fears.

"I'm sorry, Beckett. It was stupid, I never meant to-"

Kate huffs in what sounds like annoyance and disentangles her hand from his to hoist herself up into a sitting position, wrapping the same hand around the back of his neck, and oh, _oh _- she's kissing him.

She hums, a soft, content, and very unBeckett-like noise as she brushes her lips over his, paints the seam of his mouth with a tentative stroke of her tongue, and he finally remembers he has hands he should be putting to good use.

Castle spreads a palm at her hip, allowing it to drift along the hem of her loose t-shirt and slide beneath when she sucks his bottom lip into her mouth. She moans low in her throat at the touch of his hand to her bare skin, her spine arching to press her chest to his ribcage, and he curls his other hand at her cheek, cradling the sharp line of her jaw in his palm.

"You should just stay here," she breathes, sweeping her thumb in a soothing back and forth motion over his pulse that both calms and drives him crazy all at once.

Huh. He may have just accurately described his constant reaction to her presence in his life.

He takes one last kiss from her mouth, memorizing the rich taste of her, the flavor of sleep and minty toothpaste with the faint traces of the wine they'd shared after dinner bursting on his tongue before he can pull away and rest his forehead to hers instead.

"You'd be okay with that?" he mumbles, still feeling the heat of her skin beneath his fingertips, and she nods.

"It's a waste of time when we end up in each other's room every night anyway."

"You're a smart woman, Kate Beckett."

She smirks, but allows him to keep his arm around her as he sinks into the mattress, bringing her with him. She lets him hold her for a moment, snug and safe against his chest, but she turns a minute later, readjusting back to her side like she had been when he had first opened her door. He only grins when she grabs his arm, draping it over her stomach, arranging his body around hers until she's comfortable, and he would laugh if he knew it wouldn't risk offending her.

He's spooning with Kate Beckett in his guest bedroom. He thinks this may be the best form of irony, or maybe just inevitability.

Rick snuggles in closer and swipes a kiss across her nape before burying his face in her hair. She chuckles and pinches his forearm, but doesn't make any move to push him away.

"Best. Thanksgiving. Ever," he whispers, not even having to open his eyes to know hers are rolling. "Can this be another new tradition?"

"Go to sleep, Castle."

He's pretty sure he falls asleep with the smile stretched across his lips.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: If you celebrate this holiday - Happy Thanksgiving! If not, thank you for reading anyway and just know that I'm thankful for all of you who are kind enough to support me in any way. It's incredible and my gratitude to you is indescribable **


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